Richard Widmark: A Princeton legend

Richard Widmark made his radio debut in 1938 in “Aunt Jenny’s Real Life Stories.” His radio career continued through 1944 where he was in the drama “True Confessions” for NBC and played Albert in “Ethel and Albert,” a comedy on ABC radio. He would be starring in “Trio” on stage at New York City’s the Belasco Theater starting in December. Since late in February of 1944, it had taken all of his concentration to focus on his acting.

Second Lt. Donald Widmark, Richard’s younger brother, almost 26, was the co-pilot of Wacky Donald, a Ford B-24H bomber, #42-7567, flying at 15,000 feet, and cruising at a speed of 200 mph. The plane and crew were part of the 445th Bomb Group, 700th Bomb Squadron of the 8th Air Force, based in Tibenham, England. It was Feb. 24, 1944, and they were crossing Holland on a mission heading for Gotha, Germany. The pilot was Second Lt. Robert A. Blomberg; Second Lt. Emery J. Verga Jr. was the navigator; Second Lt. William J. McKee Jr. was the bombardier; Tech Sgt. Clement Leone was the radio operator; Staff Sgt. Edward Cooper, ball turret gunner; Tech Sgt. Richard F. McCormick, top turret gunner; Staff Sgt. John Sheppard, tail gunner; Staff Sgt. John Gunning, left waist gunner; and Staff Sgt. Eugene Hickey rounded out the crew of 10 at right waist gunner.

Widmark and some of this same crew had been downed on Dec. 29, 1943, in a B-24, #42-7550. They crashed near Alltebridge, a village in the English county of Norfolk after an uncontrollable engine fire forced the crew to bail out. The pilot was Second Lt. Donald Hansen, who did not have time to escape and was killed in the incident. On Jan. 5, 1944, Donald Widmark was also the co-pilot of the B-24H Liquidator #41-29116 bomber that had mechanical problems and was unable to land. The entire crew bailed out safely, and the plane crashed near Hardwick, England. These were tough, brave, young men who wouldn’t stay down.

The Ford B-24H was the result of a design effort to improve the defensive firepower of the basic B-24D design. It was a heavy bomber manufactured at the Willow Run complex by the Ford Motor Co., near Belleville, Mich. The plane could carry 12,800 pounds of bombs and was outfitted with 10, .50 caliber gunneries. The B-24H weighed 56,000 pounds, had four Pratt & Whitney R-1830-65 engines of 1,200 hp each, a maximum range of 3,700 miles, a wing span of 110 feet, was 67 feet long and 18 feet in height. It had a maximum speed of 290 mph, and its’ ceiling was 28,000 feet. The Ford B-24H cost $336,000 to build in 1944 dollars.

The Focke-Wulf 190A was a German single-seat, single engine attack fighter aircraft, that along with its counterpart, the Messerschmitt BF 109 was the backbone of the Luftwaffe’s Fighter Force. The engine was a twin-row BMW 801 radial engine that enabled it to carry larger ammunition loads. It had no problem functioning at altitudes under 20,000 feet.

Operation Argument took place from Feb. 20 to Feb. 25, 1944, as part of a series of missions against The Third Reich that became known as Big Week. The Wacky Donald was a part of it.

Feb. 24, 1944, was a Thursday, and the weather was not good. There were heavy clouds; visibility was limited; the drizzle was constant; and the attack came from the rear. The Focke-Wulf 190A seemed to come out of nowhere, and its 20mm cannons caused immense damage on its initial barrage. Tail gunner Staff Sgt. John Sheppard was killed instantly; the hydraulics were ruptured; and at the front of the plane pilot Second Lt. Robert A. Blomberg suffered fatal wounds. The co-pilot, Second Lt. Donald Widmark, took the controls and tried to bring the plane around to head back for England. Well into Widmark’s turn, the plane erupted in flames, and the German fighter was making one more pass at them. Three more of the 10-man crew were killed. Edward Cooper, John Gunning and Richard F. McCormick lost their lives in the attack and fire. The five remaining airmen, including Widmark, struggled to bail out of the seriously-damaged plane. Second Lt. Verga, Second Lt. McKee, and Sgt. Hickey bailed out in the rear, and Second Lt. Donald Widmark managed to get the top hatch open. Widmark got out followed by the radio operator Clement Leone. The 200 mph wind was brutal, and it took everything they had to hold on and get into position to push off. They had to get themselves parallel to the plane before they let go. Widmark got away and had his chute open. While Leone was making up his mind to let go, the plane exploded. When he came to, he pulled the ripcord to his parachute. He had been knocked unconscious by the concussion of the blast for several seconds. Incendiary fallout from the explosion caused Widmark’s chute to catch fire, and he couldn’t control it. He had a tough landing, coming down faster than he should have, hitting his head. Leone nearly missed landing in a lake, but he and the rest of the crew all made it down safely. They were in the area of Hardenberg, Holland.

The Dutch underground came to the aid of the downed airmen. They hid the survivors for several weeks, but the Germans eventually found the entire crew and all were sent to prison camps. The officers were sent to Stalag Luft I in Barth, Germany. Tech Sgt Clement Leone had eluded the Nazis for longer than any of them and with the help of the underground had got as far as Antwerp, Belgium. He was sent to Stalag Luftwaffe IV in Poland. POWs were loaded on trains for transfer to the camps.

Stalag Luft I at Barth was one of 48 Prisoner of War camps in Nazis occupied territory in 1944. It was situated on a strip of barren land jutting into the Baltic Sea about 105 miles northwest of Berlin. Two miles south of the main gate a massive Lutheran church marked the northern outskirts of the village of Barth. A large pine forest was the western border of the camp, and to the east and north, the waters of Barth Harbor were less than a mile from the barbed wire fence. POWs were marched to Stalag Luft I from the railroad station through the town of Barth and through the Dammtor Gate, built in the middle of the 14th Century. It is 115 feet in height and has an entrance of 13 feet in width.

The Stalag was divided into five separate areas called compounds. There were four for prison compounds: South or West, North 1, North 2 and North 3. The fifth area, for the Germans, ‘The Oasis the center, had well constructed buildings, green grass and attractive shrubbery. It was in sharp contrast to the prison compounds. The barracks in the prison compounds were 45 feet by 100 feet, 11 feet in height, and elevated 1 to 4 feet off the ground. Donald Widmark was in the South or West compound. He was prisoner serial # O686522, and he was suffering terrible headaches.

Richard Widmark and family received word in February that Donald is missing in action, and later in March, that he is a POW in Germany. Gail Castner is turning out pilots, as a civilian Army Air Corps flight instructor at Randolph Field in Texas. Max Caster is in briefings about two miles south of Bungay, England, just beyond the village of Flixton, at Bungay airfield, home of the 446th BG, Eighth Air Force in World War II. We’ll get up in the air with Max Castner next time, and I’ll keep searching for Richard Widmark in the rearview mirror.

I’d love to chat with any of you readers. Come visit me from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, June 6, at Art in the Park on Princeton’s Courthouse Square.